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Your comments are both welcome and encouraged!(The watercolor is called Magnolia Tree for Momma, by Audrey Crawford)

Saturday, August 23, 2008

Opium and the DJIA: 2007 Table

So this article came up in my search engine and it reminded me that I didn't update my ongoing 6 year project tracking the opium production in Afghanistan and the Dow Jones Industrial Average on the last business day of the year annually for the year 2007. Usually I do this in February or March of every year. If you want more background, on this interesting drama, check out my previous posts here.

Each year I've done this and been astounded at the results. The new figures are in and they are right in line with previous history... They never seem to change. The DJIA is tied in some way I cannot comprehend to the Opium production numbers out of Afghanistan...

Afghanistan produced 8200 mt in 2007. That's 92% of all the opium produced in the entire world and the most produced ever! An interesting thing to note... In November and December of 2007, the Dow hit it's record highs of over 14,000 points and began to drop right before the end of the year, so if I chart the DJIA all time high closing from October 9, 2007, just two months earlier than when I usual run the numbers, it would look more like this...

Double click on the graphs to read them better.

The Bush Administration cares so much about the Afghanistan opium production problem that it devoted 1.5 pages in a 79 page report entitled the National Drug Control Strategy Report 2008 to it.... a full half page of that is a chart and all the figures are now taken from the UNDOC reports.

While the bulk of our drug control program is based at home, there are elements of an effective drug control program that can only be pursued abroad. Internationally, we and our allies will attack the power and pocketbook of those international criminal and terrorist organizations that threaten our national security.

Although only a small portion of heroin produced from Afghan opium finds its way to the United States, the negative implications of the drug trade for Afghan security, reconstruction, governance, and economic development make countering narcotics key to achieving all other U.S. objectives in Afghanistan. ...

Much of the heroin used in the United States comes from poppies grown in Colombia and Mexico, though opium gum production in these countries accounts for less than four percent of the world’s total production and Colombian production has been cut by 60 percent since 2001. Mexico supplies most of the heroin found in the western United States while Colombia supplies most of the heroin east of the Mississippi. Long-standing joint eradication programs in both countries continue with our support. Colombian law enforcement eradicated 375 hectares of opium poppy in 2007, while the Government of Mexico (GOM) reported eradicating 7,784 hectares of opium poppy, a decrease from 2006 levels. The decline in the rates of eradication is at least in part due to the realignment of responsibilities for aerial eradication, as well as higher than normal precipitation during the key growing season.

According to the UNODC report about, 10.6% of all heroin consumed in the world is consumed in the US, Afghanistan makes 92% of all the opium produced in the world, so that means that if the other countries around the world sent ALL their heroin to the US only 2.6% of heroin used in the US could be from Afghanistan. We know though that 5% of opium produced is produced in Myanmar... That's farther away from us than Afghanistan, so I doubt more than 1% of US heroin is coming from there, so that leaves 3% produced primarily in South America.

The foregoing estimates are consistent with the UN's assessment concerning the size and magnitude of the global drug trade.

The Afghan trade in opiates (92 percent of total World production of opiates) constitutes a large share of the worldwide annual turnover of narcotics, which was estimated by the United Nations to be of the order of $400-500 billion.

Based on 2003 figures, drug trafficking constitutes "the third biggest global commodity in cash terms after oil and the arms trade." (The Independent, 29 February 2004).

Afghanistan and Colombia are the largest drug producing economies in the world, which feed a flourishing criminal economy. These countries are heavily militarized. The drug trade is protected. Amply documented the CIA has played a central role in the development of both the Latin American and Asian drug triangles.

The IMF estimated global money laundering to be between 590 billion and 1.5 trillion dollars a year, representing 2-5 percent of global GDP. (Asian Banker, 15 August 2003). A large share of global money laundering as estimated by the IMF is linked to the trade in narcotics.

All that money has to be going somewhere.... is it strange to think that the US Stock Markets are the largest drug money laundering organization on the planet?

I'll check the estimates/DJIA again next Feb and maybe one year, the lines will diverge... I can keep hoping I'm wrong right?

And oh yeah... did someone mention once that we might decide one day to fight a war on terror??? I could have sworn I heard something about that somewhere...

^ http://www.state.gov/g/inl/rls/nrcrpt/2002/html/17947.htm -- Information was found at this web address. All US information has been removed from the US Dept of State website with no explanation and I did not save the original reports (something I've corrected withthe UN report now included in the figures).

87% of the world's opium production in 2004 and 2005 came from Afghanistan eradication efforts led to an estimated 5% reduction in opium production from 2004 to 2005, but the reason for lower amounts of final product are believed to be on the processing and crow yield side more than the growth side of production.

http://www.unodc.org/unodc/en/crop_monitoring.html#afg

2006 figures so far are estimated to be at or above the levels in 2006 depending on whether or not any eradication efforts are carried out or successful (coincidentally, the stock market is also expected to rise during the year). http://www.unodc.org/pdf/research/Afg_RAS_2006.pdf

New estimate is that over 90% of the world's opium production came from Afghanistan

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Magnolia Tree for Momma

By: Audrey Crawford

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Renee has always dedicated her life’s passion & work to protecting and promoting the voting rights of Wisconsinites in a variety of ways & has been long time Milwaukee activist in Milwaukee. She was elected 5th CD Dean Delegate to the Democratic National Convention in Boston, July 2004. She is co-founder of Grassroots Northshore. Renee was a founding board member/treasurer of Emerge WI & is currently on the board of Center Advocates & WI Network for Peace & Justice. She maintains Crawford's Take blog in her spare time. Her articles featured on fightingbob.com, Daily Kos, wispolitics.com, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel & Shepherd Express as well as many other blogs nationwide. Renee was a regular political columnist in Q-Life News.

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